Talk:Santa Claus

Skip to table of contents

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Santa Claus article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12: 2 months

Wikipedia is not censored.
Images or details contained within this article may be graphic or otherwise objectionable to some readers, to ensure a quality article and complete coverage of its subject matter. For more information, please refer to Wikipedia's content disclaimer regarding potentially objectionable content and options to not see an image.

Arctic Top‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Arctic, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Arctic on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ArcticWikipedia:WikiProject ArcticTemplate:WikiProject ArcticArctic articles
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.

Holidays: Christmas High‑importance

	Holidays portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Holidays, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of holidays on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.HolidaysWikipedia:WikiProject HolidaysTemplate:WikiProject HolidaysHolidays articles
High	This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by the Christmas task force (assessed as Top-importance).

Christianity: Christmas Mid‑importance

	Christianity portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Christianity, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Christianity on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ChristianityWikipedia:WikiProject ChristianityTemplate:WikiProject ChristianityChristianity articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by Christmas task force (assessed as Top-importance).

Mythology Low‑importance

	Mythology portal This article is supported by WikiProject Mythology. This project provides a central approach to Mythology-related subjects on Wikipedia. Please participate by editing the article, and help us assess and improve articles to good and 1.0 standards, or visit the WikiProject page for more details.MythologyWikipedia:WikiProject MythologyTemplate:WikiProject MythologyMythology articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Literature Low‑importance

	Literature portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Literature, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Literature on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.LiteratureWikipedia:WikiProject LiteratureTemplate:WikiProject LiteratureLiterature articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Folklore Top‑importance

	This article falls within the scope of WikiProject Folklore, a WikiProject dedicated to improving Wikipedia's coverage of the topics of folklore and folklore studies. If you would like to participate, you may edit the article attached to this page, or visit the project's page, where you can join the project and/or contribute to discussion.FolkloreWikipedia:WikiProject FolkloreTemplate:WikiProject FolkloreFolklore articles
Top	This article has been rated as Top-importance on the project's importance scale.

Religion Low‑importance

	Religion portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Religion, a project to improve Wikipedia's articles on Religion-related subjects. Please participate by editing the article, and help us assess and improve articles to good and 1.0 standards, or visit the wikiproject page for more details.ReligionWikipedia:WikiProject ReligionTemplate:WikiProject ReligionReligion articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Daily pageviews of this article

A graph should have been displayed here but graphs are temporarily disabled. Until they are enabled again, visit the interactive graph at pageviews.wmcloud.org

This article has been viewed enough times in a single week to appear in the Top 25 Report 3 times. The weeks in which this happened:

Did you know nomination[edit]

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: rejected by 97198 (talk) 10:38, 7 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

( Comment or view )

( Article history links:

)

... that fans of the Philadelphia Eagles threw snowballs at Santa Claus? Source: https://www.thedp.com/article/2020/12/penn-football-franklin-field-eagles-santa
- ALT1: ... that during the Philadelphia Eagles Santa Claus incident, Eagles fans booed Santa Claus? Source: https://www.thedp.com/article/2020/12/penn-football-franklin-field-eagles-santa
- Reviewed:

Created by Sportsfangnome (talk). Self-nominated at 13:03, 6 July 2022 (UTC).[reply]

Sorry, Sportsfangnome, but just as in your last nomination, none of the articles is eligible because none of them has been recently created or expanded 5x or promoted to Good Article. Please, please, please read WP:DYK, especially the section on eligibility criteria, before submitting any more nominations. MANdARAX XAЯAbИAM 14:11, 6 July 2022 (UTC)[reply]

References to incorporate[edit]

I cannot edit the page, but I would like to incorporate two references on the "Representation to Children" section:

- Lévi-Strauss, C. 1952. Le Père Noël supplicié. Les Temps Modernes 77: 1572–1590.

In this article, the anthropologist explains two important things: 1) the only formal difference between Santa and other divinities or religious figures is that adults don't believe in him. 2) Santa is the result of adults using children to access magic.

- Torra-Merin, M. (2023), The hidden power of children in Christmas traditions: Unveiling the role of secrecy and agency. Anthropology Today, 39: 3-5. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8322.12845

Children of some age can lie about knowing the truth. Thus, is not unusual for them to be an active part of the deception. Even in spite of adults believing it otherwise. Mtorra (talk) 13:51, 23 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The description of the first source makes it sound like the article claims Santa is unique compared to other magical beings that children hear about but adults don't believe in (e.g., the Easter Bunny, Tooth fairy, Sandman, Leprechauns, elves, fairies, etc.). That doesn't sound very accurate. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:14, 23 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The first article does not talk about those magical beings you mention.

However, Lévi-Strauss main arguments are not only applicable to Santa but all of them; since is the adult disbelieve what makes them "false", and through all of them adults use children to make magic be felt in the society. In fact, compares Santa to Kachina, explaining that they are similar in those aspects.

This use of children is explained by Michael Taussig on his chapter in Aesthetics Subjects, and in the second reference from my first comment. Mtorra (talk) 16:36, 24 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It sounds like the argument is "the only formal difference between one set of magical beings (e.g., Santa) and another set of magical beings (e.g., God) is no competent adults believe in Santa, and most competent adults believe in God."

Is the part about adults manipulating children to make magic be felt in society the more important point? WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:48, 24 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Yes! But not necessarily is about "manipulating" the little ones. I believe it is better to say "use", as in some cases they can decide to play along with adults' deceptions. Mtorra (talk) 22:29, 24 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@Mtorra, if you make another six edits, you should be able to edit this article yourself. Have you thought about which ==Section== this information should go in? WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:06, 28 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Home of Santa Claus[edit]

I would suggest to elaborate region dependent home of Santa at the beginning of the article. Currently the article seems to strongly support North Pole being the home which is not always the case outside of the North American region. A suggestion: ...who make the toys in his ~~North Pole~~ workshop, and with the aid of flying reindeer who pull his sleigh through the air. The location of Santa's workshop has been disputed, set to be located at the North Pole, Finnish Lapland and many other places. 2001:14BA:4FF:FA00:8F71:1526:D7AD:7E4 (talk) 22:34, 24 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I have striken "North Pole" from the lede as suggested. I don't see the need to get into the dispute in the lede, as this is covered in the "Home" section. GreatCaesarsGhost 14:11, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion of coal given to “bad” children missing[edit]

The notion of Santa giving coal to "bad" or disobedient children, in their stocking, is nowhere to be found. It's referenced in one of the sources but not included in the article. Cyberbytli (talk) 15:56, 29 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

There is a discussion of predecessor figures punishing bad children. If we mention coal, we would need some context for when/where this belief emerged, and where it exists today. GreatCaesarsGhost 14:15, 9 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]